Born in Boston in 1954, Michael Karas knew from the time he was a youngster that he wanted to be an artist. He graduated from the New England School of Art and Design and continued his studies at the Gloucester Academy of Fine Arts in Gloucester, Massachusetts. From 1978 to 984, he lived and painted on Cape Ann.
At the end of 1984, Karas and his wife, Fern, left the Cape and set out on an eighteen-month adventure, 25,000 mile journey. Michael painted in over a dozen national parks, and the natural wonders sparked new levels of inspiration for him. One of his goals in his paintings is to show his love of nature, and to capture a mood or moment in time rather than a specific place.
He has received more than 23 awards for excellence and in July 1982 was the featured artist in American Artist Magazine with his painting on the cover. The noted marine artist John Stobart said the following about Karas: “It’s not so much what he paints, but the way he handles the paint. . . .Karas paints like a master and presents a major contribution to the survival of the craft.”
About one of Karas’s seascapes, Jacqueline Hall, art critic, wrote: “One feels the richness of paint, the deftness of the brush strokes. [He] captures the furor of the ocean with a power worthy of Winslow Homer.”
Source:
American Artist magazine
